Note: I was just about to post this entry when I saw Gj’s take on our spring cleaning yesterday. Instead of letting a perfectly good post go to waste, I decided to just publish this anyway.

Weekends are meant to be spent doing all the fun things you could only think about doing during the week but doesn’t have time for. If we could have had our way, we should have spent last weekend in the sun with friends, or perhaps even indoors with Gj putting in practice time in learning his recorder while I read. Unfortunately, we did neither. We did the usual grocery shopping and bought a stepladder and tape measure at Bunnings on Saturday while we spring cleaned our apartment yesterday. With only a few weeks lease left in our current apartment, we would have preferred to just clean the apartment before the we leave but we got a notice for inspection last week before we even informed the agent of our intention to vacate within a few weeks time.

Rental properties usually undergo inspections to make sure that the tenants are taking care of the premises and that the appliances and fixtures are properly maintained. Inspection frequency is pretty arbitrary as this is the first inspection we’re going to have for our current apartment after more than a year of leasing it. That’s pretty good compared to the 3 inspections we had to undergo for our previous apartment in Canberra (once just after we moved in, another six months after that and then another one just before we moved out).

As an aside on these inspections, here’s my take on it. Looking at a property owner’s point of view, I could understand the need for these inspections. Surely, anyone who would have to shell out money for the maintenance of the building would have an interest in how the building is being used and maintained by the people renting it. What I don’t get is doing an inspection just after the tenant has moved in. Surely, they already know the state of the building and its facilities and the fixtures after the final inspection of the previous tenant, won’t they? As a tenant, I don’t appreciate the fact that I now have to worry about cleaning the stove and its normally oily/sticky hood when I haven’t even cooked one meal in the place because all my things are still in boxes! However, we would still be having our things in boxes this time around too because they never left their boxes since our move from Canberra over a year ago as the current place is simply to small to accomodate all of our things. Additionally, we’ve also started packing some of our things in preparation for the move to our new place.

Wonder what the real estate agent would make of it if we create a maze of boxes for him to navigate inside the apartment tomorrow? He probably won’t be very happy and all our window-cleaning, ceiling-sweeping and wiping would be all for naught if he gets frustrated and marks the inspection a failure. Better keep the boxes to the sides then.